About Evan LeRoy
Evan LeRoy is a chef, pitmaster, and co-owner of LeRoy and Lewis Barbecue in Austin, Texas. An Austin native who attended the Texas Culinary Academy, he built his early career at Hill Country Barbecue Market in New York City and at Freedmen’s Bar in Austin, where he developed the approach to inventive, technique-driven barbecue that would define his later work. In 2017, he co-founded LeRoy and Lewis as a food truck with partners Lindsey LeRoy and Sawyer and Nathan Lewis. The concept earned a reputation for what the team calls new school barbecue, an approach that treats barbecue as a cooking method rather than a fixed menu, applying whole-animal butchery, non-traditional cuts, and fine dining sensibility to smoked meats. Texas Monthly ranked LeRoy and Lewis in its Top 5 BBQ Joints in 2021 and number two on the Texas Top 50 list in 2025. The restaurant moved from food truck to brick and mortar in 2024, the same year it earned a Michelin star in the inaugural Texas Michelin Guide. LeRoy was a James Beard Award semifinalist for Best Chef: Texas in 2025. His cookbook New School Barbecue is scheduled for release in May 2026.
Episode Overview
André Natera sits down with Evan LeRoy to talk about what it takes to earn a Michelin star doing barbecue in Texas, and what that recognition actually means for a craft that has historically operated outside the fine dining conversation. LeRoy explains the philosophy behind new school barbecue, how he thinks about whole-animal utilization and side dishes as equal contributors to the meal, and why the science of wood selection, seasoning, and smoking technique matters as much as any other culinary discipline.
They cover the biggest mistakes pitmasters make and how to fix them, why LeRoy and Lewis’s approach to barbecue starts with ingredient sourcing and ends with the guest experience, and where the category is headed as it earns the kind of critical attention that was once reserved for white tablecloth restaurants. It is a deep, technically grounded conversation about one of Texas’s most important culinary traditions and the chef who is redefining what it can be.
Topics covered in this episode:
- How LeRoy and Lewis became one of the first Michelin-starred barbecue restaurants in Texas
- The philosophy of new school barbecue and treating smoked meat as a cooking method rather than a menu category
- Whole-animal butchery, non-traditional cuts, and why side dishes matter as much as the meat
- The science of wood selection, seasoning, and smoking techniques at a professional level
- The biggest mistakes pitmasters make and practical ways to correct them
- Moving from food truck to brick and mortar and what the transition changed operationally
- Texas Monthly Top 50 recognition and what it means within the Texas barbecue community
- Where Texas barbecue is headed and how Michelin recognition is changing the conversation
Guest
Subscribe to Chef’s PSA on YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/@ChefsPSA?sub_confirmation=1
Shop Chef’s PSA Merch
https://shop.chefspsa.com/
Chef’s PSA Website
https://chefspsa.com/
Listen on Spotify
https://open.spotify.com/show/5KSFsCD3tLUPNSRi6Bcomu
Listen on Apple Podcasts
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/chefs-psa/id1451691585
Watch on YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/@ChefsPSA
Listen on Audible
https://www.audible.com/pd/Chefs-PSA-Podcast/B08JJNXJ4K